


Storytelling.

by Lanna Michaels (lannamichaels)



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Meditation on a theme, Time Period: Night of Yuri Vorbarra's Massacre, Time Period: Reign of Yuri Vorbarra
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-17
Updated: 2011-04-17
Packaged: 2017-10-18 06:04:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,011
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/185800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lannamichaels/pseuds/Lanna%20Michaels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The stories they tell and the stories they don't about the night of Yuri's massacre.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Storytelling.

When, years later, they will speak of this, they will talk about the clear moonlight through the trees and the glimmer of the water, and Xav will say, it was a peaceful night for so much death.

And he will not mention the way the baby cried when the armsman placed him in his arms. He will not mention that he did not put Padma down for six hours and he will not say how much his arms ached by the end, but he would not put the baby down, because of the fear that he will not give voice to, even years later, and he will not talk about the jealousy that coursed through him when Jacqueline finally convinced him to let her keep Padma safe, and Padma stopped crying as soon as his grandmother took him.

And does it matter that Armsman Karev's uniform is torn and dirty, that the Vorbarra crest is splattered with blood, that he had killed two of his brother-armsmen earlier that night? Later, he will talk about having to face down the enemy wearing your own uniform, and other armsmen will clasp him on the arm in sympathy, but he will not talk about the sickness in his gut when he had watched one of them bleed out, he will not say that the last whispered breath, his name on a dying man's lips, haunts his nightmares for the rest of his life, and he will not talk about the shame he feels when he stands before Xav, covered in the Vorbarra arms and Vorbarra armsmen's blood, and Xav tells him, with an expression of complete murderous intent on his face, that he did well.

When, later, they speak of this, they talk of Padma's thick blanket and the way he laughed as they made their way through the night, out of the city, and they will talk about who gave report, they will talk about Piotr Vorkosigan meeting them at the dock, dragging Aral behind him, they will talk about Ezar Vorbarra opening the gates to Green Army Headquarters as they approached and meeting them by the guard house with welcome and treason on his lips, and they will talk about oaths and Aral keeping Padma on his lap while the adults argued, and Piotr will say, fondly, that the two of them fell asleep because discussing fortifications must be terribly boring when you're a child.

And does it matter that Padma's clothes are black and silver and that Aral is wearing solid brown? Does it matter that Aral carries a Vorkosigan house dagger and that Padma is covered in other people's blood? Does it matter that they have both seen death tonight, but Aral will remember it until the end, and Padma never will?

They will say that Padma spent the war in a Vorpatril strong-hold, far away from the front lines, and when they mention the furor in the discussion over if Aral should go with him, they will not say that Xav cried or that Piotr's hands never relaxed or that Jacqueline called them both savages.

They will say only: Aral decided to stay at the front. And they will not say, because they do not know, that Padma giggled when Aral said goodbye and that Aral had smiled because, in all of this, there was someone who would need to be told about it all later, when there could be a later, and so they could make it all sound much more heroic and brave than it actually was, instead of a night of death and blood and gore and tears and pissing yourself in the woods, and a baby crying because he hadn't been fed, and so many lives destroyed that it defied counting, and Aral Vorkosigan, at eleven, choosing to stay with the adults.

And, in this story, Padma will always be the baby, and Armsman Karev will always carry him out of the nursery while others covered them with stunner fire and four men and eight women died to buy their lives, and, when telling this story, they will always say that everyone died bravely. And they will never talk about the smell or how Padma's nurse died shielding him with her body, and they will always say, only, that Padma's life was saved by not being with his parents that night.

But sometimes they will say how close Yuri came to succeeding that night and sometimes they will talk about the boat on the water and the patrols on the bridges above the river and they might, at times, joke with Aral about getting sea sick, when the mood is very dark and the night is darker still.

Perhaps one day Aral will tell Padma that he thought he would never see him again, and perhaps one day Xav will tell Piotr that he forgives him for his choices, and perhaps one day everyone who lived through that night will have died and the only stories left are the ones they spoke of to others, instead of the truths they may have spoken to each other, and maybe some day, this will become just a story in a book somewhere, something far off and maybe a little romantic and certainly historical, _how a war got started_ , but nothing like it was.

And do the bored students hearing about this know that Princess Jacqueline, the Betan pacifist, the bereaved mother and grandmother, killed ten men that night and dozens more in the war? Does it matter that she never forgave Piotr for living when her daughter did not? Does it make a difference that she took her cut out of Yuri, too? Will it ever matter that, of all the survivors of that night, the baby was the one who was killed in a war?

And for all the words and stories told, they do not know that, deep in that dark night, a grandfather held his grandson to his chest and listened to the baby cry and thought, _so this is how it all ends._


End file.
